“I rather be Right than Correct”. If you have intelligent ears to hear, intelligent eyes to see, and intelligent mouths to speak, the statement is perceived in the Age of Trumpism. Today, assertion is increasingly made without the intelligence. There is a confusion between the term “right” and the term “correct”. “Right” means that which is morally correct, just, or honourable. It has a long list of inferences which simply may not be true in an assertion . The truthfulness is just foolishly assumed without the intellectual discussion for correction. “Correct” means free from error; in accordance with fact or truth. However, the context of a conversation does not need to be absolutely correct; the claim might be “free from error, in accordance with fact or truth” for the context (Holsinger 2011). There is a spectrum of views in this conversation. The economist John Maynard Keynes said, “I would rather be vaguely right, than precisely wrong.” So, a fool without the education will be incorrect to abuse John Maynard Keynes’ quotation in a vain attempt to legitimize the assertion, “I rather be Right than Correct”, in anything else than narrow-minded version of subjectivism (Crane 2006). The AI Overview on Google puts it:
“I’d rather be right than correct” means that the speaker prioritizes having their opinion or viewpoint validated, even if it’s not technically accurate, over being factually “correct” in a situation, potentially implying a stronger emphasis on personal conviction and standing by one’s beliefs, even if they are not fully supported by evidence.
In simpler terms what a person is saying, in “I’d rather be right than correct”, is “I taken this stance in rejecting any demand of ‘political correctness’ upon me, even if the demand is correct.” It is simply a bloody-minded assertion, and it is up to rest of the society whether the “bloody-minded assertion” is tolerated, e.g. tolerating “I’d rather be right about my choice to be antisemitic or to be anti- Phoenician than correct on the applied history”. Bernard Williams argued that the amoralist does not care and the ethical appeal can only be to those who intelligently care; the amoralist does not. Tolerance is up to the society collectively.
“Political correctness” is the practice of being careful not to offend or marginalize people from certain groups. It involves using language and actions that are respectful and inclusive. It is the ‘demon’ that the ‘Right’ polemists argue. Those who attack “political correctness”, as an unreflective assertion, are attacking being respectful and inclusive.
There are cases where the assertion is not about historical thinking at all (Wineburg 2016). Historical thinking must include explanation in Historical Sociology; from Narrative, General Theory, and Historically Specific Theory (Calhoun 1998). This is a significant failing in our educational sphere since there is a lost of memory in the system of History Education and the Historical Method (Fallace 2010). As Grove (2016) claimed, “Historical Thinking is an Unnatural Act.” It requires the artefact (“not-natural”) of memory. In the Australian education system today is a “Crisis of Disenfranchisement” in the Historical Literacy Curriculum (Gyimah & Allen 2016). It is evident in what the curriculum reduction has come to, in the average classroom for “Historical Sociology, Modernity, and Postcolonial Critique” (Bhambra 2011).
There are a few cognition solutions:
- Value and Practice “Truth and Authenticity in Contemporary Historical Culture” (Classen & Kansteiner 2009).
- Understand the many connections between “Historical thinking” and “historical consciousness” (McLean, Cook, Lévesque, Stanley, Rogers, & Baroud 2017).
- Understand Bernard William’s concept of Historical Distance(s) (1985: 162) and its histories (e.g. Pearl 2016). Bernard Williams introduced the concept of “the relativism of distance”. According to Williams, only when a society is sufficiently ‘close’ to ours, which is to say, roughly, only when it is a real option for us to adopt the ethical outlook of that society, is there any question of appraising its ethical outlook (as “right”, “wrong”, “correct/incorrect”, “unjust”, or whatever).
Examining the ideology and its impact for incorrect thinking, it can be said that:
- In populistic Rightist thinking is an obsessive or far-too strong connection of ‘Self’ and history construction (Hunt 2014). The egoism creates a stance as the abuser of truth has ‘My Correct Views on Everything’ (Novick 1991).
- Too often there is a confusion between ‘Historical Fiction’ and ‘Fictional History’ (Mickel 2012).
- Ruth Perry (1992:15) stated that, “The Phrase ‘Politically Correct’, like a will o’ the wisp on the murky path of history, has glimmered and vanished again as successive movements for social change have stumbled across the uncertain terrain.”
There are good Australian academic historians who have engagements in this type of intellectual history (e.g. reference to Dirk Moses in White 2005). Nevertheless, the country has too few intellectual historians employed or contracted to make a difference in the Australian population. Here the responsibility is of government, as well as the universities.
Bibliography
Bhambra, G. K. (2011). Historical Sociology, Modernity, and Postcolonial Critique. The American Historical Review, 116(3), 653–662. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23308219
Calhoun, C. (1998). Explanation in Historical Sociology: Narrative, General Theory, and Historically Specific Theory. American Journal of Sociology, 104(3), 846–871. https://doi.org/10.1086/210089
Classen, C., & Kansteiner, W. (2009). Truth and Authenticity in Contemporary Historical Culture: An Introduction to “Historical Representation and Historical Truth.” History and Theory, 48(2), 1–4. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25478834
Crane, S. A. (2006). Historical Subjectivity: A Review Essay. The Journal of Modern History, 78(2), 434–456. https://doi.org/10.1086/505803
Fallace, T. D. (2010). John Dewey on History Education and the Historical Method. Education and Culture, 26(2), 20–35. https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5703/educationculture.26.2.20
Grove, T. (2016). Historical Thinking Is an Unnatural Act. History News, 71(2), 22–25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44605931
Gyimah, Mellissa, & Shawndra Allen. (2016). Critical Historical Identity: Countering the Crisis of Disenfranchisement in the Literacy Curriculum. Black History Bulletin, 79(2), 6–11. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5323/blachistbull.79.2.0006
Holsinger, B. (2011). “Historical Context” in Historical Context: Surface, Depth, and the Making of the Text. New Literary History, 42(4), 593–614. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41328988
Hunt, L. (2014). The Self and Its History. The American Historical Review, 119(5), 1576–1586. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43698891
McLean, L. R., Cook, S. A., Lévesque, S., Stanley, T. J., Rogers, P., & Baroud, J. (2017). Introduction: Historical thinking, historical consciousness. Canadian Journal of Education / Revue Canadienne de l’éducation, 40(1), 1–5. https://www.jstor.org/stable/90002341
Mickel, E. J. (2012). Fictional History and Historical Fiction. Romance Philology, 66(1), 57–96. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44741973
Novick, P. (1991). My Correct Views on Everything. The American Historical Review, 96(3), 699–703. https://doi.org/10.2307/2162426
Pearl, J. H. (2016). A History of Historical Distances. The Eighteenth Century, 57(3), 391–395. https://www.jstor.org/stable/eighcent.57.3.391
Perry, R. (1992). Historically Correct. The Women’s Review of Books, 9(5), 15–16. https://doi.org/10.2307/4021229
White, H. (2005). The Public Relevance of Historical Studies: A Reply to Dirk Moses. History and Theory, 44(3), 333–338. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3590819
Williams, Bernard (1981). Moral Luck, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Williams, Bernard (1985). Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, London: Fontana
Williams, Bernard (1995). Making Sense of Humanity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Williams, Bernard (1995). World, Mind, and Ethics: Essays on the ethical philosophy of Bernard Williams, J.E.J.Altham and Ross Harrison (eds.), with “Replies” by Bernard Williams. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
Williams, Bernard (2002). Why Philosophy Needs History, London Review of Books, October 17, 7–9.
Williams, Bernard (2002): Truth and Truthfulness: An Essay in Genealogy, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Williams, Bernard (2005). Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Williams, Bernard (2005). The Sense of the Past: Essays on the History of Philosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
Williams, Bernard, ‘Berlin, Isaiah (1909–97)’, in Routledge Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (London and New York, 1998: Routledge), vol. 1, 750–3
Wineburg, S. (2016). Why Historical Thinking Is Not about History. History News, 71(2), 13–16. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44605928
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Book Review of the ‘Righteous Mind’
Neville Buch
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